T'Ang Shun-Chih and Statecraft in Ch'Ang-Chou

When compared with nearby Su-chou and Yang-chou currents of thought, the Ch'ang-chou academic environment was unique because of the statecraft concerns that dominated its classical scholarship. By "statecraft" (ching-shih, lit., "ordering the world"), we mean a commitment not only to a world-ordering theory to which all Confucians adhered but also to technical expertise. The latter often included astronomy for calendrical reform, hydraulics for flood control, and cartography for military purposes. Technical competence was an important part of the statecraft issues for Ch'ang-chou literati.^[4]

Classical techniques (ching-shu ) required mastery of a wide range of practical subjects. The distinctive place that statecraft thought and practice held in Ch'ang-chou literati traditions can be traced back to the sixteenth-century contributions of T'ang Shun-chih and Hsueh Ying-ch'i in local and national affairs. Ying-ch'i, a friend and Ch'ang-chou landsman of T'ang Shun-chih, had perhaps closer ties with the Tung-lin partisans in Wu-hsi than did T'ang. He had studied under Shao Pao, a teacher at the Tung-lin Academy prior to its seventeenth-century revival. The founder of the Tung-lin partisans, Ku Hsien-ch'eng, along with Hsueh Fu-chiao, Ying-ch'i's grandson, studied under Hsueh Ying-ch'i. After Ku Hsien-ch'eng and Kao P'an-lung, Fu-chiao was one of the central figures among the Tung-lin partisans, particularly in his home county of Wu-chin. Hsueh Ying-ch'i was a direct disciple of Ou-yang Te, a fervent follower of Wang Yang-ming, which places Ying-ch'i in the Yang-ming tradition.^[5]

Although he had publicly censured Wang Chi, one of the most radical members of the T'ai-chou school, for his excessive liberties with Wang Yang-ming's teachings, Hsueh Ying-ch'i stoutly defended Wang Yang-ming, especially his attempt to link knowledge and action. Wang's stress on the mind was tied to practical affairs, and to what Hsueh called "holding fast to things" (chih-shih ). The mind, when properly trained and cultivated, served as a guide for statecraft policy: "The mind that holds fast to affairs is precisely the individual's mind.".^[6]

[4] Li Chao-lo, an expert in geography, was typical of Ch'ang-chou literati. See Chao Chen-tso's "Hsu" (Preface) in Li Chao-lo, Yang-i-thai wen-chi , pp. 1a-2a.

[5] Huang Tsung-hsi, Ming-Ju hsueh-an , pp. 256ff (chüan 25). See also Goodrich et al., eds., Dictionary of Ming Biographies ,pp. 703, 619-22, 1102-4.

[6] Hsueh Ying-ch'i, Fang-shan hsien-sheng wen-lu , 3.1a-21b, 4.1b-3b. See also Busch, "Tung-lin Academy," p. 96.

Hsueh saw in Wang Yang-ming's teachings not a subjectivist escape from practical affairs (his accusation against T'ai-chou scholars), but rather the moral basis for practical concerns and statecraft policies. In a letter to T'ang Shun-chih, Ying-ch'i was critical of contemporary scholars for missing the key to Wang Yang-ming's stress on "studies of the mind" (hsin-hsueh ). Wang's call for the unity of knowledge and action (chih-hsing ho-i ), according to Hsueh, had been forgotten by his so-called followers who shallowly discoursed on their teacher's claim that the mind was, in its origins, neither good nor evil (wu-shan wu-e ) and who neglected to put their ideas into practice through concern for statecraft.

Both Hsueh Ying-ch'i and T'ang Shun-chih were committed to statecraft agendas, which would significantly influence the Tung-lin partisans and continue to be an important feature in Ch'ang-chou intellectual life even after the fall of the Ming dynasty. Below, we will focus on T'ang Shun-chih's contributions to statecraft discourse in late Ming Ch'ang-chou Prefecture.^[7]

A literatus who left his mark as a Confucian scholar, official, and literary stylist, T'ang Shun-chih came to immediate prominence in national and local life when he finished first on 1529 metropolitan examination at the age of twenty-two. The T'ang lineage, which traced its ancestry back to Yang-chou, had produced Hanlin Academy members during the Sung and Ming dynasties. Shun-chih's father, T'ang Yao, passed the chü-jen examination in 1510, and his grandfather T'ang Kuei passed the metropolitan examination in 1490. Firmly entrenched in Ch'ang-chou local society, T'ang Yao had arranged for Shun-chih to marry the daughter of Chuang Ch'i, from the increasingly prominent Chuang lineage. The biographies for both T'ang Yao and Shun-chih in the Ch'ang-chou prefectural gazetteer were posthumously prepared by the Tung-lin leader Ku Hsien-ch'eng.

T'ang Shun-chih was strongly influenced by the teachings of Wang Yang-ming, which he studied in Peking under the T'ai-chou scholar Wang Chi, whom Hsueh Ying-ch'i had attacked. Shun-chih had a stormy political career and was banished twice, although his advice was much sought after. His forced absences from the political arena allowed him to explore his statecraft interests in geometry, astronomy,

[7] See Hsueh Ying-ch'i, Fang-shah hsien-sheng wen-lu , 5.11b-12a, 17a-18a, for Hsueh's stress on practical studies and his correspondence with T'ang Shun-chih. For Hsueh's sympathies with Lu Hsiang-shan (1139-92) and Wang Yang-ming, see ibid., 8.1a-2a, 17.14a-16b.

and military strategy. He is generally regarded as one of the most important mathematicians of his time, especially in trigonometry. His studies encompassed Islamic traditions in astromony that had been passed down in China. His second period of banishment from the imperial court allowed T'ang to develop his literary interests while living in a cottage in the hills of I-hsing County, famous for their underground caverns and scenic spots.^[8]

Calendrical Studies and Mathematics

In an effort to ground Confucian theory in affairs of state, T'ang Shun-chih appealed to his fellow literati to undertake a new regimen. In his view, the centrality of the mind for moral awakening (pen-hsin ) was tied to the "teaching of holding fast to things" (chih-shih chih chiao ), which was the literatus's responsibility to master. Seeking a unification of theory and practice, T'ang turned to calendrical science and mathematics. "Concrete studies" since the Yuan astronomer Kuo Shou-ching's pioneering breakthroughs had lost their vitality and became, according to Tang, "lost learning" (chueh-hsueh ) for the last three centuries.^[9]

T'ang Shun-chih's efforts to reintegrate calendrical studies and mathematics with Confucian learning in the sixteenth century signaled a broadening of literati traditions in Ch'ang-chou, where T'ang's views were most influential. He argued his position on the basis of Nco-Confucian theory and the technical aspects of calendrical science. According to Tang, trigonometric "calculations" (shu ) had become totally separated from the "underlying principles" (li ) by which one understands calendrical studies. The solution, Tang contended, was a reintegration of "underlying principles" with trigonometric "calculations":

One must know both calendrical principles and calculations. This is where I differ from [contemporary] Confucian students. One must know both fixed calculations [ssu-sbu, lit., "dead calculations"] and variable calculations [buo-sbu, lit., "living calculations"]. This is where I differ from [contemporary] officials in charge of the calendar. Principles and calculations are not

[8] Ch'ang-chou fu-chih (1886), 23.33a. See also P’i-ling T'ang-shih chia-p'u (1948), "Hsu" (Preface) by T'ang Ho-cheng, pp. 1a-4a; "Wu-fen shih-piao," ts'e 9, pp. 1.1a-b; "Tsung-hsi shih-piao," ts'e 1, pp. 1a-5a; ts'e 19, pp. 11b, 19a-b. Cf. Goodrich et al., eds., Dictionary of Ming Biography , pp. 1253-54.

[9] T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi (1573), 6.36b-40a, 7.15a-18a.

two separate things. Calculations represent the concrete application and extension of principles. Variable calculations and fixed calculations are not two separate things [either]. Fixed calculations represent the basis for variable calculations.
Recently, I have met one or two Confucians who are still intent on numerology [hsiang-shu chih hsueh ], but they don't have access to the intact [astronomical] tradition. Consequently, they continue to use empty speculations about heaven and earth within the scope of Confucian scholarship.^[10]

T'ang held up the "six arts" (liu-i ) of the sage-kings as the model for reintegrating Confucian theory with concrete studies. T'ang described the ancients' successful integration of calculations into the Way but contended that the link between theory (i, lit., "meaning") and numbers (suan-shu ) had been severed by later Confucians who had denigrated the study of numbers as a "lesser technique" (hsiao-tao ) not worthy of the attentions of the Confucian literatus. Instead, T'ang called for a return to the more comprehensive vision of antiquity in which the mathematical arts were accorded a deservedly prominent place.^[11]

T'ang's attempts carried over from calendrical studies to Chinese mathematics, particularly early forms of trigonometry used to solve simple simultaneous equations in astronomy. In a series of essays (lun ) on triangles and segments of a circle in geometric calculations (chi-ho-hsueh ), T'ang clearly distinguished between new (hsin-fa ) and old methods (chiu-fa ) of calculation in solving equations and determining remainders. These essays preceded by a number of decades the earliest Jesuit transmission of medieval and Renaissance European science to China. T'ang's initiatives were part of what Willard Peterson has described as a larger effort among Confucians in Ming China to reform the calendar before the arrival of Jesuit missionaries. Techniques of calculation, dependent on mastery of mathematics, were part of what T'ang Shun-chih deemed essential to integrate Confucian theory with technical expertise.^[12]

Classical Studies and Philology

Such concrete interests were also evident in T'ang Shun-chih's discussion of the role of theory and practice in classical studies (ching-hsueh ). T'ang sought a similar balance between philosophical discussions of the

[10] Ibid., 7.16a-17b.

[11] Ibid., 7.19b-21b.

[12] Ibid., 17.25b-44a. See also Wu-chin Yang-hu hsien ho-chih (1886), 26A.7a-8b. Cf. Peterson, "Calendar Reform."

mind (hsin-hsueh ), popular among the Wang Yang-ming schoolmen of his day, and more precise philological studies of the Classics favored by Confucian scholars who stressed phonology (hsing-sheng ), paleography (wen-tzu ), and etymology (hsun-ku ) in their scholarship. "The mind," according to T'ang, "could not be separate from the Classics, just as the Classics could not be separate from the mind." Instead, T'ang sought a philologically precise understanding of the Classics that would also "capture and illuminate the refinement and subtlety of the ancients.".^[13]

Evidence from the late Ming literary world suggests the existence of a close link between the training required to master the art of composing ancient-style prose (ku-wen ) and the ability to carry out a philological examination of ancient texts. The essayist Kuei Yu-kuang, who came from nearby K'un-shan County (in Su-chou Prefecture), foreshadowed the move toward what would be called "Han Learning" (Han-hsueh ) during the eighteenth century. The cultural agenda for the Confucian effort in the 1700s to "return to antiquity" (fu-ku ) moved away from questions of wen as literary recreations of the past and toward the Classics themselves as the repository of classical models. In his discussion of the debates surrounding the Old Text and New Text portions of the Documents Classic, for instance, Kuei Yu-kuang demonstrated how literary interests and classical studies were becoming increasingly intertwined:

I recalled accordingly how the documents of the sages had been preserved for ages. Many of [these documents] had been ruined, however, by several Confucians. What can be relied on to distinguish between the authentic and forged [parts] is simply the differences in phrasing [wen-tz'u ] and style [kochih ]. Later persons, although they tried to imitate [the original] with all their might, in the end they could not get it correct right down to the minutest detail. Scholars, on the basis of the phraseology, can reach the sages and not be deluded by heterodox theories.
Today, the fact that the phraseology transmitted in Fu Sheng's [New Text] Documents and that of the [Old Text] version recovered from the wall in Confucius' house are different does not require [extensive] discrimination to understand. Formerly, Pan Ku [32-92] in the bibliography [to his History of the Former Han Dynasty ] listed a Documents Classic in twenty-nine chapters and an ancient Classic in sixteen scrolls. This "ancient Classic" in Han times was earlier [known to be] a forgery [by Chang Pa (fl. ca. first century B.C. )]. It was separated from the other Classics and not mixed up with them.^[14]

[13] T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi (1573), 10.3b-5a, 10.8b-11a, 11.34a-35b.

[14] Kuei, Kuei Chen-ch'uan hsien-sheng ch'üan-chi , 1.15a-16a. For discussion, see Chi Wen-fu, Wan-Ming ssu-hsiang-shih lun , pp. 98-105. A similar pattern can be observed in the emergence of "Ancient Learning" (Kogaku ) philology in Tokugawa Japan from literary studies. See Okada, Edo ki no Jugaku , pp. 62-110.

Recovery of "ancient learning" (ku-hsueh ) for Kuei Yu-kuang meant rendering it relevant for the present. Writing about the decline of classical studies during the Ming, Kuei evoked a sense of reverence for the past, which had been lost in Ming literary production:

Moreover, I venture to say that not until the Sung [dynasty] were classical studies greatly illumined. Today, however, all of the writings of the Sung Confucians are preserved, but why is it that there are so few who understand the Classics? The Classics are not the works of a single age; in addition, they cannot be fixed [in meaning] by the views of a single person . . ..

Consequently, those who wish to understand the Classics, if they do not seek after the mind-set [hsin] of the sages and remain throughout in the arena of talk, if they remain fond of [disputing] similarities and [noting] differences, then the will of the sages will be even more unattainable.

What was required, according to Kuei, was a return to the broadly based "model learning" (kuei-hsueh ) of Han dynasty Confucians.^[15]

Like Kuei Yu-kuang, T'ang Shun-chih was concerned that the followers of Wang Yang-ming had misdirected Confucians away from the comprehensive studies (po-hsueh ) that had undergirded the classical vision of statecraft. T'ang was intimate with several of the more radical "left-wing" followers of Wang Yang-ming, especially Wang Chi, and was sympathetic to the goals of the Yang-ming schoolmen. But he was also apprehensive about the Buddhist and Taoist aspects of the Yang-ming agenda. He feared that literati values, which should stress "practical application" (shih-yung ) of Confucian theory, were increasingly being swallowed up by the passive and quiescent ideals of Buddhism and Taoism.^[16]

What disturbed T'ang was the eclectic mixing of theories and values that served only to dilute the Confucian concern for practical affairs. He noted that during the last centuries of the Chou dynasty (1122?-221 B.C ), for example, Confucians, Taoists, Mohists, and others had contended for intellectual hegemony. Each tradition had its own "original form" (pen-se ), which distinguished each from the other. Such plural-

[15] Kuei, Kuei Chen-ch'uan hsien-sheng ch'üan-chi, 3.4b-5a, 1.19a. For a discussion see Lin Ch'ing-chang, "Ming-tai te Han-Sung-hsueh wen-t'i," pp. 133-50.

[16] Kuei, Kuei Chen-ch'uan hsien-sheng ch'üan-chi , 11.5b. See T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi (1573), 5.7a-10a, 17.18a-b, for T'ang Shun-chih's correspondence with Wang Chi. See also ibid., 5.18a-b, 7.10b-11a, 10.1a-3b.

ism, T'ang argued, maintained the integrity of each position; each tradition was in turn transmitted to posterity more or less intact.

Since the T'ang (618-902) and Sung dynasties, however, the integrity of the various traditions had been compromised. Literary men filled their works with esoteric discussions of "nature and external necessity" (hsing-ming ) that brought together the various traditions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism into an undifferentiated mass of conflicting positions. In the process, the "original form" of Confucianism, that is, its statecraft agenda, had been diluted.^[17]

To remedy this sorry state, T'ang Shun-chih called for a rooting out of heterodox doctrines:

Those who in antiquity brought disorder to our Way, for the most part, came from outside of the Six Classics and Confucius. Those who later have brought disorder to our Way frequently come from the midst of the Six Classics and Confucius . . .. It has reached the point where our Confucians affirm two disparate doctrines and unite Confucianism and Buddhism as one.

Buddhism had become a fifth column in Confucianism, subverting the teachings of antiquity. A thoroughgoing purification of the classical tradition, according to T'ang Shun-chih, was as essential as a literary transformation, recapturing the Way of antiquity with ancient-style prose and transmitting it intact to posterity. Literary reform and classical purification were the key elements in T'ang's program for "returning to antiquity.".^[18]

Classical philology (hsiao-hsueh ) for T'ang Shun-chih was an important corrective to the excesses of the followers of Wang Yang-ming. Like Kuei Yu-kuang, T'ang appealed to Han Confucians as the proper source for a Confucian orthodoxy. While not yet advocating a full-blown return to Han Learning, T'ang nevertheless labeled portions of the Neo-Confucian legacy as "heterodox." The turn to Han Confucians, in its initial stages, can be seen in the writings of late Ming Confucians.^[19]

Nonetheless, T'ang Shun-chih, like his Tung-lin successors, held up the teachings of Ch'eng I and Chu Hsi as the orthodox interpretation of the role of the mind in Confucian discourse. T'ang's stress on Han Confucianism was made within a framework in which the centrality of Sung

[17] T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi (1573), 7.10b-11a.

[18] Ibid., 10.1b-2b.

[19] Ibid., 10.8b-11a. For a discussion see Lin Ch'ing-chang, Ming-tai k'ao-cheng-hsueh yen-chiu , pp. 14-35.

Learning was affirmed, while the excesses of Ming Neo-Confucians were reformed. The road back to antiquity followed literary and classical guidelines erected first by Han Confucians and then reconstructed by Sung Neo-Confucians.^[20]

Ancient-Style Prose

Along with his contemporary, Kuei Yu-kuang, Tang Shun-chih became most famous during the sixteenth century for his advocacy of ancient-style prose, a literary style used by T'ang and others to break away from the strictly imitative techniques used by his Ming predecessors. Peter Bol had described how Confucian literati since the Northern Sung dynasty (960-1126) had defined themselves in light of cultural values that emphasized literature (wen ) as a medium for civil, literary, and cultural learning. The ku-wen revival had its origins in the mid-T'ang, when Han Yü, among others, had called for revival of ancient forms of writing to counter the influence of Buddhism.

After the eleventh century, ancient-style prose became the literary vehicle for formulating literati values. To imitate antique styles, it was thought, signaled mastery of ancient wisdom and its application to the present. Consequently, ancient-style prose was both a literary and ideological movement. The wisdom of antiquity could be tapped for the present if the Confucian literatus mastered the difficult art of composing ancient-style prose.^[21]

Efforts to redefine literati values during the Ming dynasty, particularly during the sixteenth century, took the form of rethinking ku-wen. If Confucians could overcome the strictly imitative tendencies that prevented students from discovering the interrelation of literary form and classical substance, then the spirit of antiquity could be recreated within contemporary literati life. T'ang Shun-chih observed:

Suppose there are two people. One has a transcending mind and is said to be one who possesses an insightful eye able to encompass past and present. Even if he never held a piece of paper or a writing brush, or pored over books to learn to write, he simply relies on his own feelings or thoughts to write freely, as if composing a letter to his family. His writing may be sketchy or unrefined, but it definitely has no vulgar, worldly, hackneyed, or pedantic air. It is simply the excellent writing of the world.

[20] T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi (1573), 10.3b-5a.

[21] Goodrich et al., eds., Dictionary of Ming Biography , pp. 1252-56. See also Diana Yu-shih Mei, "Han Yü"; Hartman, "Han Yü as Philosopher"; and Bol, "Culture and the Way," pp. 1-85. Cf. Ching-i Tu, "Neo-Confucianism."

The other person remains just like a man of the world of dust. Although he singlemindedly has learned to write, and in the so-called rules and regulations of prose he is correct in every way, no matter which way he turns, what he produces is no more than the chattering of an old lady. Looking for his true spirit and eternal and ineluctable views, none are to be found. Although his prose might be artistically refined, it must be considered of inferior quality. This [difference] is what I mean by the "original form" [pen-se ] of prose writing.

T'ang Shun-chih wrote about the disjunction between ancient models and contemporary practice evident among Ming literati. He noted that the reunification of ancients and moderns (ku-chin ) required the individual to recognize that literary style as a means to academic success was an empty echo of the classical world. Clever stylists might at first disguise their inherently empty visions of antiquity, but the disguise would fail when the flowery prose was measured against the concrete matters of policy and practice.^[22]

For T'ang Shun-chih, the cultural values of the Confucian literatus should be rooted in classical theory and practice informed by literary form and content. Heavily influenced by Wang Yang-ming and his followers in his early years, T'ang's vision of literary production focused on the application of classical values to "concrete studies" (shih-hsueh):

First, you have to be intent on the concrete. Then you have concrete studies. Once you have concrete studies, then you have concrete matters. The techniques of the Way [Tao-shu ] have not been clear in later ages. Consequently, what people have called "affairs and achievements" for the most part have been limited to what can be achieved through talent and brains and cannot do justice to [concrete matters] . . .. One must observe how ancient sages and worthies depended on themselves to effect [the Way]. Affairs and achievements were a mirror by which to measure oneself.^[23]

T'ang Shun-chih's emphasis on "concrete studies" was not an idle boast. His vision of the values of the Confucian literatus included a rejection of pure theory in favor of a program that "held fast to things" (chih-shih ) in all their complexity. He rejected "high-minded discussions of nature and external necessity" (kao-t'an hsing-ming ), if they were removed from the concrete concerns of statecraft to which the sages had devoted themselves. Idle theory translated into empty literary

[22] See T'ang Shun-chih, Ching-ch'uan hsien-sheng wen-chi , 7.11a, 7.25b, 11.25b-26b, 11.27a-28b.

[23] Ibid., 8.7b-8a. See also 5.35b-38b.

production, which shielded the literatus from the true locus of his Confucian calling. Mere "talk" was morally suspect.^[24]